


Whenever You're Ready

by Quentanilien



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-12
Updated: 2014-05-12
Packaged: 2018-01-24 11:39:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,119
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1603802
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quentanilien/pseuds/Quentanilien
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wherein Bellamy and Clarke begin to understand each other, Bellamy recalls their first meeting, and Clarke surprises him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Whenever You're Ready

**Author's Note:**

> This could be considered a scene missing from canon in 1x08 before their return to camp. The flashback came about because I couldn’t resist writing a scene of them meeting on the Ark that could also fit into canon. Imagine it, if you will, lens flares and all, and I'll be over here drowning in a puddle of my own Bellarke feels.
> 
> I don’t own The 100 or any of the characters, although I wish I owned Bellamy Blake.

“We’ll figure something out.”                                                                       

“Can we figure it out later?” 

“Whenever you’re ready.” 

Her voice is soft, full of sympathy that he doesn’t deserve. Bellamy leans his head back against the rough bark of the tree, staring up at the black sky that seems even darker when he remembers how the light of 320 bodies falling to Earth looked just a few nights before. He’s afraid to lower his eyes, the hallucinations still so vivid that he swears he’ll see them lurking in the trees if he does. He tells himself that they’re not real, that the fear is false, and it’s true, but it’s also a lie. The hallucinations are false but the bodies are real, and he killed them. He deserves to be haunted forever. 

He remembers the way Jaha’s eyes burned into his, telling him he didn’t deserve the peace of death. That fear is real. Jaha is still alive, and while Bellamy is glad to have one less death on his conscience, he’s also terrified. Terrified that Octavia will be left alone in the world. Terrified to die. He’d been begging for it minutes before, but he fought Dax for his life and for Clarke’s, and now he knows. 

He lowers his eyes and they land on Dax’s still form, and Bellamy is sorry for that too. He can hardly blame the kid for trying to do the exact same thing he did just weeks before. 

Dax already faced the consequences though, and Bellamy still has to. He doesn’t want to think about that, doesn’t want to think about 320 bodies burning a path through the atmosphere, doesn’t want to think about blood blooming bright across Jaha’s stomach, doesn’t want to think about his mother getting floated, doesn’t want to think about a bullet shoved through Dax’s flesh and carotid artery and leaving him choking and gasping to bleed out on the ground. 

So he concentrates on Clarke sitting beside him, still breathing in short gasps as she tries to get a grip on herself again, one arm just brushing against his as her shoulders heave up and down. They’re far from camp, completely exposed to the night. There could be Grounders watching them, but for some reason he’s never felt more safe since landing on Earth than he has right at this moment, with this stubborn, brave, infuriating girl sitting next to him that he now knows he trusts implicitly. Ridiculous as that might sound, Bellamy can’t help how he feels. 

To think he hated her once. Before, when she was just another member of the privileged class, and after, when she challenged him at every turn. He’s not sure when things shifted between them, but it’s been coming for a while. Now she wants to help him. She wants to figure out a way to save his life. She needs him. 

Bellamy closes his eyes finally, because that one thought is a beacon in the midst of his hopelessness. Maybe, just maybe, if he has someone that determined on his side, he has a chance. A chance to live, a chance to learn to live with himself. 

He’s casting back into his mind for memories, something to distract him for a few precious minutes, and he lands on one. The first Unity Day masquerade dance he worked as a cadet, when his mother was still alive and Octavia was still safe and sound in their quarters. When the future still had a possibility of looking bright. 

He’d hovered on the edge of the crowd of teenagers, caught somewhere between jealousy and happiness. Jealousy because they looked so carefree, and he hadn’t been carefree since the day Octavia arrived. Happiness because at least _someone_ got to be carefree, even if it wasn’t him. 

The smile hovering at the corner of his mouth had faded when he noticed some of the children of the council members dancing in a group near him. They were easy to spot, even with their masks on. Their hair was always a little bit cleaner, their clothes a little less shabby, than everyone else’s. A little blonde who had her back turned to him yanked Wells Jaha’s mask off with a giggle. The Chancellor’s son tried and failed to look angry, lunging towards the girl with a huge grin on his face and looping a finger through the elastic holding her mask on. 

“Wells!” the girl shrieked in protest, hands flying up to save her mask a fraction of a second too late as she stumbled back, tripping over someone’s foot and colliding straight into Bellamy’s chest on her way down. He followed her partway down, hands wrapping instinctively around her elbows and hauling her back up before she could hit the ground. He got a faceful of her thick blonde braid as he did it, and she smelled like some kind of flowery shampoo he’d probably never be able to get for Octavia. He inhaled deeply before he could stop himself, before she could turn around and see he was doing it. She was laughing and breathless, he could feel her body shaking with it, and she was gasping, “Sorry, I’m so sorry,” even before she had turned around. 

She was steady on her feet again, and she turned to face him, tilted her head back because even when she was standing at her full height he towered over her. And then he saw wide blue eyes and a dazzling smile, and it was Clarke Griffin, daughter of a council member and the chief engineer, as close to royalty as anyone got on the Ark. 

Bellamy stared down at her for a second. Pretty little princess with her pretty blonde braid and her pretty little smile that was fading the longer he stared at her. “I’m so sorry,” she said again, like he hadn’t heard her the first time. Her eyes dropped to his hands, which he realized too late were still wrapped around her arms. He let her go quickly, and her eyes wandered back up to his face. 

Bellamy forced a smirk. “No problem, Princess.” 

Her brow furrowed in confusion. “My name’s Clarke.” 

A chuckle slipped out of Bellamy’s mouth. A real one. “Yeah, I know what your name is.” _Everyone knows your name_. 

She still looked puzzled, and Bellamy wondered if she really didn’t understand what she was, the difference between her and nearly everyone else in the room. 

The next song started up, a pulsing, pounding beat, and she had to raise her voice to be heard. “I don’t think we’ve met—” She cut herself off, head swiveling to the side. Her friends were shouting for her to get back over there. 

There were a lot of things Bellamy wanted to say to that. _Of course we haven’t met_. _Like you’d even remember if we had_. _Like you’d ever give the time of day to someone like me_. _I’m just a cadet_. _My job is to stand here and watch you live your perfect life_. But he didn’t say any of them. 

She was looking at him again, one eyebrow raised, and his eyes dropped when he noticed she was holding out a hand. For one confused second he thought she wanted to shake hands, but then he realized her body was angled towards the dance floor like she wanted to pull him behind her, and a smile was tugging at her lips again. For one brief heartbeat, Bellamy’s hand twitched, ready to take hers, ready to follow her. And then the ridiculous little dream came crashing down when he remembered who he was. What he was. 

He shook his head, veering his hand away from hers and towards his jacket to make things clear to her. _I’m a cadet_. _I’m on duty_. _I’m too old_. _And I have no business touching you_. 

Her smile faltered a little, and she moved her lips. The music was too loud to hear what she said, but he could read it well enough. “Thank you,” the little princess said, and then she was elbowing her way through the crowd, away from him and back where she belonged. 

He’d completely forgotten about the encounter until the drop ship landed on Earth and Clarke pushed herself through a sea of teenagers once more, towards him this time. Challenging him for the first of many times, no trace of recognition in her eyes. He’d been bitter about her defiance and bitter that she didn’t remember him, not even for a second, and he’d used that bitterness to fuel his anger. He wanted Earth to be a new world, where people weren’t born into privilege but earned it, what little privilege there was down here. Earth was going to be the great equalizer, and Clarke represented the Ark and everything he was trying to run from. 

But now—now everything is different. The princess is implying they’re a team, using words like _we_ and sharing responsibilities and promising to help him and saying everyone needs him—her most of all, because she said that first. She said _I need you_ , then she said _we need you_ , like it was an afterthought, an extension. Forgiveness, acceptance, patience, respect—she’s giving him all of that, and he doesn’t deserve any of it. But he wants it. 

“I’m so sorry,” she’s saying, and his lip curls up at the irony, at how they’ve come full circle and she doesn’t even know it. “I’m sorry you had to do that.” 

Bellamy angles his head just enough to catch her in his peripheral vision, then follows her gaze to Dax’s body. “Would’ve been you if it wasn’t me,” he says roughly. 

She sniffs and wipes an angry hand across her nose. “It’s not fair,” she whispers, and he knows what she means. 

His hand finds its way back to her knee, and he pats it awkwardly. Such a small, ineffectual motion. He doesn’t know how to give her comfort. But it must be enough, and she understands, because she curls towards him, just slightly. He thinks her cheek might be resting against his shoulder, but the touch is so light he can’t feel it through his jacket, and he’s afraid to look. 

They sit like that for what feels like hours, until Clarke breaks the silence again. “I figured it out.” 

“What?” Bellamy’s voice comes out a broken half-whisper, like he doesn’t have the energy to speak out loud anymore. 

“How to save you,” she says, and the steely determination is back in her voice. The fallen leaves rustle as she sits up straight, and Bellamy finally feels safe enough to turn his head and look at her. Her eyes are bright again and brimming with purpose, because Clarke needs to help people and she needs to have a plan, or else she’s not actually living. 

Bellamy waits, watching her face as the final parts of her plan click into place. “We’re going to talk to the Chancellor when we get back,” she says, then rushes ahead like she expects him to protest. “We’re going to tell him everything you’ve done down here, and that you deserve to be pardoned just like the rest of us.” 

Bellamy can’t help interrupting. “Everything I’ve done?” His voice is filled with self-loathing. “Yeah, that’ll really help my case.” 

“Stop it, Bellamy,” Clarke orders in her no-nonsense tone. “And if he still won’t do it—well, a little trade never goes amiss.” 

Bellamy stares at her, feeling like he’s missing something really obvious. “What do I have to trade?” 

Clarke smiles, and it’s dazzling in the middle of the dirt and the grime and the darkness. “A name.” She looks very pleased with herself. “Trust me, he’ll value keeping his life far more than taking yours.” 

Bellamy swallows hard, a new appreciation for Clarke tugging a weary smile onto his lips. “Blackmail, you mean. Didn’t think you were capable of it, Princess.” 

She frowns, and he doesn’t know if it’s because of the nickname or the admiration that just seeped into his voice. “It’s a _trade_ ,” she insists. Then the frown eases, and she adds in what could almost be a teasing tone, “And I’m capable of a lot of things you don’t know about.” 

And Bellamy gives her that, because it was her idea and she can call it whatever the hell she wants, as long as it works. And because his hand is still on her knee, and she’s leaning into it. And because he trusts her, and he’s beginning to think she trusts him too. And most of all, because she still hasn’t moved, because she understands he's not ready, and she's willing to wait until he is.

 


End file.
